Cardinal Yvenna
“Saints have ever been a bridge between the God-Emperor and mankind; a stepping stone from the mortal to the divine. It is sadly however a link that can cloud the Master of Mankind’s holy message as it is filtered through the imperfect lens of these blessed, dead heroes.” –Cardinal Yvenna, Markayn Arch-Diocese Titles: Temple Mistress of the Calistra Covenant Seat of Power: Solomon Arch-Diocese: Markayn Marches Yvenna might have a remote diocese, only marginally more powerful than that of Quiro (whom she detests), but she makes up for it with a fiery temper and burning ambition. Among the youngest of the Sector Synod Cardinals, only just into her second century, Yvenna is a tall, striking woman with stern features and a shock of crimson hair; all part of an image she has cultivated to impress her dominance upon the minds of those around her. In her time as cardinal of the Markayn Arch-Diocese, she has relentlessly pursued the interests of the Ministorum and gone to great lengths to tighten its grasp on the worlds of the sub-sector. Unfortunately, in her crusade for power she has been neither kind nor gentle with noble houses and Administratum officials, creating many enemies and numerous headaches for Ignato. For this reason she is being courted by Kregory for her support within the Sector Synod, and charmed with the promise of more direct support from the central Ministorum synods for her diocese. While she flirts with such offers, Yvenna is too sharp-minded to be easy prey for Kregory’s overtures---though there may yet come a time when she chooses sides. Beyond the politicking of Ignato and Kregory, Yvenna has her own concerns. The remoteness of many of the worlds within her diocese as well as its high proportion of undeveloped or frontier worlds has made many of the dark and forgotten corners of the Markayn Marches a haven for renegades and heretical cults. Although the heretics are neither especially unusual nor especially dangerous, the zealots who have showed up to purge them have been causing her problems, especially the Red Redemption. Ostensibly, the Red Redemption is part of the Ministorum; they are a fanatical cult focused on hunting down and purging anyone or anything they see as an affront to the God-Emperor (which needless to say is a pretty long list). However the Redemption often sees itself as separate from the core church, not corrupted or restricted by pointless bureaucracy or administration. This is the case in the Markayn Marches and Yvenna has found herself coming head to head with Archdeacon Ludmilla, leader of the Redemptionists, as the Red Redemption swells in number within her diocese. She has presented her concerns to the Sector Synod, but with other things to worry about, Ignato and the other cardinals have largely ignored her reports, putting them down to a ‘local disturbance’ and deeming this not an issue for the greater Ministorum to deal with. Unknown to the cardinals, however, is that the problem may be far greater than they realize and on more than one occasion Redemptionists and Ministorum servants have clashed in the remote reaches of the sub-sector such as the under-archives of Prol IX, the grey fields of Dreah and the forests of Mosul as Ludmilla urges her followers to cleanse the worlds of the Marches and hunt out those of weak faith. It seems only a matter of time before things deteriorate further and open fighting begins as either Ludmilla declares the Markayn Synods corrupt and compromised by the dark powers or Yvenna tires of the Redmeptionist’s meddling and brings the full weight of her diocese and its resources crashing down upon their heads.